Piedmont's New Pool Is Heading Into Its First Winter. Here's What Opens Up When the Teams Get Out of the Water.

The Activity Pool at the Piedmont Community Pool stays between 83 and 85 degrees all year. That is warmer than the Settlemier Competition Pool next to it, which the City keeps at 78 to 79. The 12 lanes and two diving boards of the bigger pool get most of the attention. Through the colder months, though, the shallow pool with its zero-depth beach entry and three lap lanes may be the part of the complex that matters most to people who live a few blocks away.

The pool opened to the public on Saturday, April 11, 2026, so this is its first fall. Most of what newcomers learned about it came from summer, when lessons filled the warm water and youth teams claimed the competition lanes in the evenings. November reverses that. For anyone swimming laps or dropping in on a weeknight, the pool's best season may be the one about to start.

The warm pool got its evenings back first

The first change has already happened. Fall swim lessons started September 29, and the City put weekday lessons on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday only. The City of Piedmont said in a release the Piedmont Exedra ran in August that it made the change based on community feedback, "so the Activity Pool will be free for drop-in open swim on more evenings."

That follows a summer of adjustments. In June the City tried reserved Activity Pool open-swim slots during some lesson periods, and called it a trial through July 23. Moving lessons to three weekday evenings is a more lasting fix to the same problem. Families who want warm water after school or dinner now have Monday and Friday evenings without lessons, plus the in-between hours on the other days.

The lesson calendar runs into late November. The Fall Activity Guide lists group sessions on Tuesdays from October 27 to November 17, Wednesdays from October 28 to November 18, and Thursdays from October 29 to November 19. Once those sessions end, the warm pool's weeknight schedule should loosen again.

What the teams have been holding in the big pool

Two teams have used the Settlemier pool since August. One is the Piedmont High School water polo team. The other is the Piedmont Swim Team, now in its 50th season and back in its home pool after years of training at other pools around the East Bay. A June profile in the Piedmont Exedra put the team at about 190 swimmers.

From August 10 through October 30, the City's July notice set the Competition Pool aside for water polo practice on weekday evenings and on Saturday mornings from 9 to 11 a.m. The August update gave the exact start times: team practice from 5 p.m. on Mondays, from 6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, and during parts of Wednesday and Saturday mornings. Even with those blocks, the City counted more than 61 hours of lap swim and 66 hours of rec and open swim in the Competition Pool each week.

The printed Fall Activity Guide uses a slightly later date than the July notice. It keeps the restricted lap schedule through November 13 and switches to the full one on November 14. Here is the change for main-pool lap swimmers:

The 1 to 2 p.m. midday closure applies on weekdays under both schedules.

The biggest gains come at the edges of the day. Wednesday lap swim returns at 6 a.m. instead of 8. Monday swimmers get two more evening hours. On the other weekdays, lap swim now runs to closing at 7 p.m., and Saturday's 9 to 11 a.m. window opens back up to laps. For someone who can only swim before work or after it, the second half of November offers the most lane time this facility has had since opening. The guide also notes that the number of open lanes changes during the day, and the City asks visitors to check the live pool schedule before going.

The dates that bend the schedule

Fall facility hours started October 1. For October 1 through November 30, the guide lists Monday to Friday 6 a.m. to 7 p.m., Saturday 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Sunday 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. These dates change that pattern between now and the winter break:

1. Friday, October 30. The City's July notice lists this as the last day of team practice reservations in the Competition Pool.
2. Saturday, October 31. Halloween hours are 6 a.m. to 5 p.m., opening an hour earlier and closing two hours earlier than a normal fall Saturday.
3. Wednesday, November 11. Veterans Day holiday hours are 7 a.m. to 6 p.m.
4. Saturday, November 14. The full lap-swim schedule in the Fall Activity Guide begins.
5. Monday, November 23, and Tuesday, November 24. Splash Break Camp for ages 6 to 10, with water-safety lessons, pool games and recreational swimming.
6. Thursday, November 26. Thanksgiving hours are 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., according to the City's pool page.
7. Monday, December 21, and Tuesday, December 22. A second round of Splash Break Camp.

The fall guide's published hours stop at November 30. Hours for December and January will come in the City's next schedule.

The pool has also started hosting seasonal events. On Saturday, October 24, the Floating Pumpkin Patch sent children ages 1 to 12 into the water to pick their own floating pumpkins, then decorate them, in three one-hour sessions at $12 per child. A Cardboard Boat Build & Race took place in September.

What an annual pass buys once summer is over

The longer lap hours and the warm pool together change the pass math. On September 1, annual passes went up about 10 percent, and single-visit drop-in rates stayed the same. The City's pricing page shows these rates starting September 1, 2026:

Regular drop-in rates are $18 for adults, $16 for seniors and $12 for youth if you're a resident. Nonresidents pay $22, $18 and $14. At those prices, a resident adult pass equals about 54 drop-in visits, or roughly one swim a week for a year. Summer adult and senior drop-in rates were higher, but that season ended September 30, so the regular rates apply now.

The once-a-week figure is why winter access matters. If the pool were only appealing in July, an annual pass would mean paying for months you don't use. With the Activity Pool held at 83 to 85 degrees all year and lap swim widening in mid-November, the City is pricing the pool as a weekly routine for all twelve months.

A first year the City says it is still tuning

The City is open about the fact that this schedule is still a draft. Its pool page calls the first year of operations "a period of learning and adjustment, as we work to balance the needs of many user groups and maximize access to the water." Several user groups share one complex: lap swimmers, families, lesson students, the high school water polo team and a 50-year-old club team. Each of the changes above came from moving one group to make room for another.

The feedback process has a set structure. The City's user survey opened August 25 and accepted responses through September 30. It asked about schedules, registration and check-in, hours and programming, facility comfort, and reserved open swim at the Activity Pool. The City said it would review the answers alongside attendance and use data. On October 21, the Recreation Commission agenda included an informational item on pool operations and programming over the first six months. The pool page still links a comment form for anyone who wants to weigh in between surveys.

Getting here took longer than planned. A January look-back in the Piedmont Exedra reported that construction was mostly finished by September 2025, but commissioning the mechanical and pool systems delayed the opening. Completion had once been targeted for 2024. The ribbon-cutting took place in the rain on April 10, and the all-electric complex opened to the public the next morning.

Six months later, the City is changing the schedule season by season, and the next change starts November 14, when the guide's full lap hours return to the Settlemier pool's weekday evenings and Wednesday mornings.

If the City's season-by-season scheduling has you thinking about how your own rooms, garden or backyard pool could fit the way your household actually lives, Hope Broderick & Co can help you plan that change room by room. Start your home transformation.